


The Tale of Zander Rogue

by TyForestWrites3



Series: Team SHDW [6]
Category: RWBY
Genre: BLCK and KLAW are important for later, Bad decisions are made, F/M, I'll leave that up in the air, Introduction to a new power system, Richard and Christina are also important for later, Schnee Dust Company has its own private army of mercenaries, Sienna and Zander's relationship is undefined, being Khan is hard, can be read as platonic or romantic, introduction to a major character, it will be explored in depth much later, mentioned death, mostly focused on Sienna, not like it matters later, simply because her character was wasted
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-05
Updated: 2020-04-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:01:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23501257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TyForestWrites3/pseuds/TyForestWrites3
Summary: The introduction to one of the most powerful characters in this series.
Relationships: Sienna Khan & Original Male Character, Sienna Khan/Original Male Character
Series: Team SHDW [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1690849
Kudos: 1





	The Tale of Zander Rogue

SDC mercenaries were jerks. Sienna Khan had run into her fair share of them in the White Fang's goal of peace and respect. And thus the reason why she had wanted more... progressive protests. Fighting back, defending themselves. The High Leader never would have approved of violent reactions. The actions of the Arcadian Pack had further boosted his opinion on the matter. But Ghira Belladonna was no longer the High Leader. She was. And how appropriate that her first big mission on the throne was taking out a group of SDC mercenaries that were spotted marching near their base.

Jacques Schnee's personal mini-army was already enough to deal with when the White Fang was only doing peaceful protesting. And when the Arcadian Pack began their various rampages, those mercenaries only got deadlier. But now, Sienna knew that this would be a new beginning, a new flag rising. She went out onto the soon-to-be-battlefield personally to prepare her new troops for the fight ahead of them. And by her side was her trusted bodyguard and childhood friend, Zander Rogue.

This White Fang regiment was small, but still probably outnumbered the mercs three to one, but that mattered little when her own troops, while with much conviction, lacked experience. There would be a tough fight ahead, but Sienna had faith. The outcome of this battle will determine what would happen with her place of power, and really the future of the White Fang in general.

The setting for this battle was a massive forest just outside the main HQ, the White Fang regiment led by Sienna, Zander right behind her, marching through it, keeping an eye out for the enemies they had spotted not half an hour earlier. Suddenly, a sniper shot rang out and Sienna heard one of her soldiers cry out in pain. More shots rang out and more Faunus fell. A few more minutes of this and it became obvious that the time to retreat was near.

"Fall back!!" Sienna ordered, "Get back to the clearing!!"

Suddenly, another shot rang out, but no one fell. Instead, immediately after, she heard a metallic sound before looking back to Zander, who had swung one of his spears. There was no doubt in her mind that the bullet that had been fired was meant for her, but Zander had deflected it.

"Go," he told her, "I'll hold them off."

"What?" Sienna responded, "That's ridiculous! I'm not leaving you!"

"The White Fang can go on without me. You're a different story. Besides, it shouldn't be too much trouble to take out one little sniper, right?"

Sienna looked into his eyes and saw that arguing would get them nowhere, but she also saw something else: a look of secrecy. He knew something and wasn't letting her in on it. But nevertheless, she and the rest of her small army turned tail and retreated back to HQ.

* * *

An hour passed. One excruciatingly long hour. Sienna sat on her throne, listening again to the same update she had gotten every ten minutes. The lookouts she had posted had reported back nothing but the same message: that they heard a lot of gunfire and clashing of metal back from where they had retreated, no doubt the fight between Zander and the mercenaries. Sienna's anxiety only skyrocketed with the passing of each order, wondering how long it would be until she would have to go find Zander's body.

Then, another few minutes later, the final update came, the lookouts bursting into the throne room, and one of them yelled, "The gunfire stopped!!"

'The fighting is over,' Sienna thought before ordering, "Bring me Niflheim, Makenshi, and their respective teams. We'll find out the outcome of this fight soon enough."

Only minutes later, Bomani Niflheim and his team, Team BLCK (Black), along with Kuron Makenshi and their team, Team KLAW (Claw), had rounded up and joined their High Leader in search of Zander. When they made it to the forest, Kano Adams of Team BLCK went ahead to scout out the area. When he returned only a minute later, he had a disbelieving look on his face.

"Kano, what did you find?" Bomani asked.

"...Bodies," Kano replied, still in shock, "About a hundred of them. Do you really think-"

Sienna's eyes widened before she dashed ahead in the direction of where they once were. When she got there, she saw that Kano was not exaggerating. Dead bodies littered the ground, a hundred of them, maybe more. Her ears then caught the sound of groaning from behind a tree. She rushed towards the sound once the rest of the group caught up. And right behind the tree was Zander, pinned to the trunk by an arrow in his shoulder.

Sienna gasped at Zander's condition, causing him to look up and give a slightly crooked smile, "See... what'd I tell you? Heh-ow, it hurts to laugh..."

"You knew there was more out here... didn't you?" Sienna asked, certain of the answer.

Zander slightly nodded before passing out. Sienna sighed, but smiled before ordering Bomani and Kuron to grab him and get back to HQ. It was then that she knew that Zander wasn't going to die on her that easily. But some small bubbling thought in the back of her mind warned her of this. Zander was powerful. Perhaps too powerful.

Sienna immediately shook that thought from her head. No. Zander was loyal. Even more than that, he was her friend. He had no thoughts of overthrowing his own childhood friend. That was a preposterous notion.

Wasn't it?

* * *

As the years went by, their dynamic never changed. Zander was loyal to a fault, and only proved that more so. He was powerful, yes, even more so than her, but Sienna's doubts of his loyalty had all but vanished when she overheard someone talking to him about him replacing her on the throne. Zander snapped at the traitorous member, proclaiming that he never wanted to hear a single word of a coup against Sienna again. The almost-traitor has flinched and backed down, but grumbled as he walked away.

Then came the time. Back when Ghira Belladonna was High Leader, he had hired two human scientists, named Richard and Christina. Sienna wasn't exactly sure what they did, but what she did know was that they were desperate. Normally, humans joining the White Fang was a preposterous notion, but according to Ghira, they were just as dedicated to equal rights as the Faunus were. Plus, it was always a good thing to know what the view from the other side was like.

At first, the two scientists weren't exactly doing anything much, just a bunch of studying and research. Then one day, they came to Ghira with the idea of studying Grimm and how to better fend them off. The former High Leader thought that if they helped the overall community in this way, perhaps the White Fang's reputation could gain a more positive ground. After all, it was for the benefit of the society, right?

However, once Ghira stepped down, the idea was scrapped by Sienna, who was no longer looking to help society, but rather gain a stronger fighting force. So when the time came to have a talk with these two scientists, who had begged her to let them keep their job (which felt strangely gratifying), she told them to continue what they were doing, but to find a way to weaponize it.

Though reluctant, the two humans agreed, and the experimentations begun. After about a year, the scientists had stopped asking for Grimm to examine (they had gone through a lot of those monsters since the Grimm couldn't survive for long in captivity) and claimed that they might have found a way to do what Sienna had told them, but they needed volunteers to experiment with. Now, after Sienna's turn to be reluctant, the High Leader agreed and sent word out to their factions.

After she did so, Sienna asked them, "Why exactly do you need volunteer test subjects?"

"Because we don't know exactly what will happen," Christina informed her.

Richard then reached into his pocket and pulled out a vial filled with a sort of black ooze, "This is what we managed to create. We believe if we inject this into a Faunus, or a human, whichever, it doesn't matter, they could potentially grow stronger."

"But what is it?" The High Leader asked.

"Do you know how Grimm dissipate into smoke whenever they die?" Christina replied, "Well, we managed to kill a few Grimm and capture some of the smoke that appears. After that, it was a simple matter of condensation, and now we have an array of liquified Grimm Essence."

"And... what will this do once injected?" Sienna asked, raising an eyebrow.

"In theory, it could enhance the subject, possibly giving them new abilities yet to be seen," Richard answered, "But like I said, 'in theory'. We won't know until we've tested it."

Sienna sighed, but said, "Very well. You're dismissed."

* * *

Things did not proceed as anyone had expected.

Twenty volunteers came in. Fifteen left, but only because they quit once they had seen what had happened to the remaining five. Once those five Faunus were injected with the Grimm Essence, they immediately entered a twenty four hour coma. And when they awoke, they weren't the same. They became more violent, their skin turning black, bone-like structures appearing on their backs, limbs, and faces, and their eyes turning red. They had become some sort of human-Grimm hybrid, something the scientists claimed that they had not predicted.

The five subjects were detained, but it soon became clear that they didn't just gain the looks of Grimm, but gained their traits as well, including the inability to survive in captivity. However, out of respect, the five were put down, being granted a quick death. But that didn't mean the two humans didn't receive any backlash from the White Fang after that. Sienna had gone to their lab to demand an explanation.

"Well, as far as we can tell," Richard told her, "It was actually more of a mental problem than a physical one."

"What are you talking about?" Sienna asked.

"What we mean is," Christina replied, "While the subjects were asleep, their brainwaves became erratic, as if they were having intense dreams. While we are trying to modify the Grimm Essence so that we can hopefully have... less insane effects, it would be best if we had a volunteer with great mental strength."

The High Leader was quiet, pondering their words before finally answering, "Very well. But if we have to put down one more brother or sister because of this, both of you are out of here, in one way or another. Do you understand?"

Both humans responded, "Yes, High Leader."

And they got their one volunteer: who turned out to be Zander himself. Sienna highly objected to it, but Zander was immovable on the matter. He entered the lab, and the experiment begun.

* * *

One. Month.

That's how long Zander has been in a coma. Three weeks ago, Richard and Christina had been run out of the White Fang HQ. Two weeks ago, Sienna had contacted Adam Taurus to gather his team of three (who included himself, Blake Belladonna, and Ilia Amitola) to hunt down the two. One week ago, Adam called back to confirm their deaths. And now, here Sienna sat, waiting for Zander to wake up.

Did she regret ordering the murder of those two scientists? Perhaps a little. But they had indirectly killed five of her men and put her own personal bodyguard, her childhood friend, into a coma. Now it was just a waiting game, as well as to see what would happen with Zander when or if he woke up. It was a happy moment when he did approximately a week later. She was cautious at first, remembering the previous test subjects, but her fears were drowned out when he looked around in confusion.

"Wha... What happened?" he muttered, "How long was I out...?"

One long explanation later, and Zander's eyes grew confused before asking, "Wait... where are Richard and Christina?"

* * *

It had taken a week before Zander started talking to Sienna again. Turns out that he was actually quite fond of the two scientists. Claimed they were some of the nicest people he'd ever met. But Sienna had ordered Adam to have them killed anyway, and Zander didn't take too kindly to that. Even after he started talking to her again, it was in a strict, business-like tone.

Two months later, and nothing changed. Sienna wasn't counting on her friendship with him to be healed anytime soon. It was then that that traitorous voice in the back of her head started whispering to her again. Their relationship has failed to heal, Zander holding a grudge against her. What was to stop him from taking the throne from her? If he was capable of doing it before, he was more than capable of doing it now. Whatever that experiment had done, it had strengthened him. His speed, strength, stamina, and even his Aura had heightened. Adam even reported seeing Zander in the training grounds with a strange Grimm mask on, firing strange energy-like projectiles from his hand.

It was far from an easy decision, as she spent multiple sleepless nights considering it. But now, Sienna's fears won out. She had to get rid of him.

* * *

Zander had almost immediately understood what was going on the second Sienna walked into the training arena with soldiers all behind her.

"I'm sorry..." Sienna muttered.

"It's okay... And for the record... so am I."

And in a flash, Zander brought out his two spears, Kakumei & Umareta, and quickly aimed the former at them. The tips of it began to quickly spin and then fired a blast of energy at the group, causing Sienna to take cover, taking out one of the soldiers behind her. Taking that as an excuse to attack, the soldiers all rushed Zander. Sienna watched all of this unfold as if it were in slow motion. As the soldiers came upon him, she saw Zander put a hand over his face and pulled down.

Immediately, red and black energy seeped out of his fingers and covered Zander's face as he pulled down, and thus somehow creating that aforementioned Grimm mask, along with a wing made out of that red and black energy. Suddenly, he swung out both of his arms and created a blast of black Aura-like energy, blasting away the rushing soldiers. This caused the rest of the attack force, Sienna included, to recoil in shock.

Adam Taurus, on the other hand, ran straight for Zander, getting his sword out, only to get hit away by an energy blast from Zander's hand. Ilia Amitola appeared out of thin air on the right wall and struck her weapon in her opponent's direction, only for Zander to catch it, be completely unfazed by the electricity that surged out of it, and yank Ilia down to the floor. She managed to get up, only to get yanked towards him to get clotheslined by one of his spears.

One after another, the soldiers all fell, some merely knocked out, while others were outright stabbed. Nobody was killed, thankfully, but soon enough, the High Leader was the only one standing in between Zander and the exit. Sienna held her rope dart at the ready, facing her masked former friend with a determined stare, but she knew what the outcome of a fight would be. Zander walked up to her, only to walk straight past her, with no resistance.

He stopped at the exit one more time to look back at Sienna, and she did the same. No words were spoken. It was a mutual understanding. And then, Zander turned his head back around and left. Sienna felt her eyes begin to water, but closed them, trying to ignore the emotional pain.

And that was the last time she ever saw Zander Rogue.


End file.
